Sondvald (D&D 5e)

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This is Sondvald

We are strangers to Sondvald, interlopers, and while we have been here for hundreds of years, none of us are natives to this world. Possibly the Tarkatan’s to the South, but they aren’t exactly conversational about their history here, and I for one, do not plan on making such inquiries. Why we came here? None of us are certain, most of the records from the Excodus have been destroyed, for we arrived in a time of fire and death, and the Elves that ruled this place when the rest of us arrived, were less keen on preserving our histories and cultures than they were on beating back the threat from the South. Standing theories are that we fled something, destruction, enslavement, a dying world; or maybe we came from small splinter groups of our home world or worlds, seeking a fabled paradise, and while Sondvald has many wonders, I imagine our ancestors were sorely disappointed; what is known is that we came here, and for some reason, we wanted to come here. Personally, my money is on fleeing, after all, you don’t travel with only the barest of essentials when you’re migrating, you don’t carry little more than what you need to survive when you’re traveling to a promised land, no, you do that when you’re running from some sort of threat.

We weren’t the first here, not even the Elves were here first, again, maybe the Tarkatan’s were here first, but we’re still uncertain. There are ruins, and while some stem from the old Elven Empire, many are… older, and some are quite terrifying, and I don’t say that lightly. So yeah, if you ever puzzled at how a minotaur might operate a smithy with his family alongside a Dragonborn run bakery, well, I’d not blame you, Dragonborn are terrible bakers, but beyond that, now you know. There are no Dragonborn Homelands here. Sure, some set off for secluded valleys the moment they could, just as some Minotaurs founded settlements for their people in the islands, but they are not from there, not on this world.

There’s a lot of danger here, if that’s what you’re looking for, along with horrible death for the unlucky, and of course great wealth for the fortunate. Though do beware, whatever your ambitions in this world, and whatever our origins, we, the guests and current citizens of Sondvald must be wary, for whatever made us come here, just might follow after…

-Kara Warbraid.
Dwarven kook, and self styled scholar.

Overview

So, Sondvald started as a place to just toss a mishmash of whatever randomly inspired junk came my way, it wasn’t meant to be a serious campaign world, just a place to run adventures and maybe flesh out as we go. Then I had ideas, and now those ideas are forming something a touch more concrete than originally intended. That said, I still plan on dropping in whatever I like, so there will be plenty of variety in this game. Hell, I’ll even look for player input in some cases. One thing I wanted to be make sure happened with this setting, was that it would have a place for just about anything that popped up in the Unearthed Arcana articles over at www.wizards.com That way, if a PC wanted to play a warforged, while the flavor might be different from the Eberron setting, they could still play one.

Now I won’t be able to pack everything I want into these wiki pages right away, in fact I plan on avoiding the need to do that. Just know that players will have input, and this campaign will govern both my Fantasy Grounds and my face to face games. In short, it’ll be a rather tiny living world, and I think that’s kinda cool. I want this to be a fun, albeit somewhat dark (face it, that’s just my style) setting, that will hopefully become a source of many stories to come.

Sources

Here is what you can expect to use in this campaign:

The PH is fair game, though the fluff behind the races might not be the same, so consult with me if you have any questions about that. If you lack a PH or are unable to acquire one, here’s a link to the D&D Basic pdf’s, which gives you a run down on the rules and enough material to make a basic character.

Beyond that, I’m allowing material from the Princes of the Apocalypse Player’s Guide, as well as the Unearthed Arcana series of articles. Just run things by me. Here’s a few easy links to some of those materials.

Maybe some new races or a class variant from Eberron? Well, check out the Unearthed Arcana: Eberron Material Please come to me if you’re looking to use the Dragon Marks material. I’ve yet to find a way to fit that into this world.

I’m also allowing the Ranger with no spells and the Favored Soul variants to the list from here